joe hart

Well, England put in a sound performance against Bulgaria at Wembley last Friday in the first of the Euro 2012 qualifiers, with Fabio Capello seeming to fill the gaps left by the withdrawal of regulars Frank Lampard, John Terry and Rio Ferdinand with apparent ease.

But most of all England fans will surely be happy to have kept a clean sheet against a reasonable Bulgarian team and Joe Hart has emerged as the leading contender to keep the England goalkeepers jersey.

Castrol Performance research proves that Hart is indeed the current number one choice for England, his performances so far in the Premier League shows that he is well ahead of his English rivals and the Manchester City keeper is statistically second only to Chelsea’s Petr Cech so far this season.

The former Shrewsbury Town starlet has ousted Shay Given from the number one spot at City and in the first three games of the season he has conceded only once, saving an amazing 94% of the shots fired at his goal.

In contrast other contenders such as Ben Foster at Birmingham has conceded five times with no clean sheets and West Ham’s Robert Green has let in nine goals with no clean sheets.

In fairness, Manchester City are considered to be title contenders and Joe Hart is surrounded by international defenders of repute, while taking nothing away from Birmingham or West Ham, neither team has resources similar to those available to City.

None the less, Hart has started in superb form and fully deserves the opportunity to stake his claim for England, he appears focused and confident, so long may that continue.

Hart and the England defence will be aware of the aerial threat posed by Switzerland, twelve of their eighteen goals in World Cup 2010 qualifiers came from headers.

Switzerland were as disappointing as England during the World Cup finals, so both teams have a lot to prove. With Congolese born Blaise Nkufo not included in the Swiss squad expect the aerial bombardment to come from Alexander Frei and Marco Streller.

castrol performance research

Castrol make England favourites to win the game in Basel with a 44% chance, Switzerland to win 27% and a draw 29%.

A shock 1-0 defeat to Switzerland sees Spain being the only seeded team to lose their opening match, though Italy and England gave less than convincing performances in their 1-1 draws with Paraguay and the USA respectively.

Brazil spluttered past North Korea while Argentina made hard work of beating Nigeria 1-0; and the most boring game of the six days so far was most definitely Ivory Coast 0 Portugal 0.

Nobody fancied Germany before they kicked off.  But after a 4-0 thrashing of Australia they are the only team that have decided to go for it from the outset.  Never one to dismiss Germany, I was pleasantly surprised in how they played ‘the beautiful game’ instead of offering a methodical utilitarian approach to winning a match.

So with South Africa beginning the second round of matches tonight, against Uruguay, they have the chance to top Group 1 and possibly seal their place in the knock-out stages.

In a pre-World Cup Finals article I suggested the following nations would qualify from each group:

Group A: Mexico to win, South Africa – runners-up
Group B: Argentina to win, Nigeria – runners-up
Group C: England to win, USA – runners-up
Group D: Germany to win, Serbia – runners-up
Group E: Holland to win, Denmark – runners-up
Group F: Italy to win, Paraguay – runners-up
Group G: Brazil to win, Ivory Coast – runners- up
Group H: Spain to win, Chile – runners-up

I am sticking by my original predictions though Spain are going to have to have a plan b if they are going to progress.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic has agreed personal terms with Barcelona following Samuel Eto’o doing the same at Inter Milan the previous day, both club’s have issued statements that the deal is on.

Inter Milan say they are on the verge of signing Eto’o, while Barcelona have today said that Ibrahimovic is very close to moving to the Spanish treble winners.

Both club’s agree that the deal is done in principle but still requires a contract to be drawn up.

One problem that neither team appear to have considered is Alexander Hleb. The player has been offered to Milan on a season long loan as some sort of makeweight in the deal, as if the money was not enough, but Hleb says that he knows nothing about it and as far as he is concerned he wants to stay at Barcelona and fight for a place.

“I have a contract with Barcelona and am currently preparing for the new season with the team,” the Belarus international told Sport Bild,”My aim is to make the breakthrough here and be successful with this club.”

Hleb’s agent confirmed that nobody from Milan or Barcelona has spoken to the player about a move.